Marked only by a large sign with the street name and number, the unpretentious 10000 square foot (~929 square meters) building is located on a low traffic road in an average industrial park not far from the local Lockheed Martin facility. A First Solar sign, large or small, is no where in sight.

Where the lab has no name?Supporting the skunk works designation, the location is unlisted on the First Solar contact page unlike the project office across the San Francisco Bay in Oakland.

I contacted First Solar over the weekend and was surprised when they responded to my questions: “What is First Solar doing at the unmarked location? Is it an extension of the project business or a skunk works project?”

The First Solar spokesperson said: “Our Sunnyvale facility is a small R&D group.”

A Grubb & Ellis Company R&D/FLEX SPACE Flyerfrom last year notes features suitable for a small lab. Early last year, “Rumor: First Solar Looks to Experiment With CIGS” by Michael Kanellos for Greentech Media speculated CdTe (cadmium telluride) expert First Solar was investigating the CIGS (copper indium gallium diselenide) material set for potential PV commercialization.

From the First Solar Career openings for Sunnyvale, it does appear a new product or form factor is under development since a Product Design & Reliability Engineer is sought, and an Automation Engineer is needed to “Coordinate Functional Acceptance Testing, Installation and Qualification of Automation equipments to meet aggressive schedule of Factory start-up in Q4 2010”.

Although the lab’s work appears to be headed to production late 2010, it remains unclear if the efforts are directed towards a CdTe Model A or an entry into CIGS photovoltaic modules.

(Full disclosure: I own some shares of FSLR stock.)Skunk Works®is a registered trademark of Lockheed Martin Corporation.

5 comments

Good bit of sleuthing, Ed. I’ve been told by several, usually reliable industry sources that the work at FSLR’s “skunk works” is indeed focusing on CIGS, although no one at the company will (or would) confirm it.